Monthly Archives: March 2010

I couldn’t embed the following video, SBS Dateline of Australia had an excellent documentary chronicling events in the Caucasus Mountains along Russia’s southern fringe, where a hidden war is escalating.

According to Russian media outlets, in Moscow radio programs devoted to subway bombings, ordinary citizens have expressed their view that this was the work of Russian secret services, whose purpose is to further “tighten the screws” of “ungirdled” society that dared to criticize and demand the resignation of Putin.

The reaction to the bombings is: that even, if the attacks have been really carried out by the Caucasian Mujahideen, the Russian society is now inclined to blame Putin and the FSB for the bombings.

A 10-year incessant talk about the “victory” in the Caucasus and the “pacification of Chechnya” is a de facto approval by Russia’s public of a campaign of monstrous terror in Chechnya, which killed 250 thousand civilians, including 42 thousand Chechen children from 0 to 11 of age, led to an extension of the war far beyond Chechnya.

Today, it is more and more evident that a moment of truth has come to the Russian society.

It is obvious that the Russian society does not want itself to answer for their criminal acts – for the murder of a quarter million people. Therefore, according to the law of genre, a chief culprit should be named. And it would be likely Putin, even if the Martyrs’ Brigade Riyad-us-Saliheen would later claim responsibility for the Moscow metro attacks.

Hence the explanation of Putin’s hysteria, who after the bombings said he is immediately returning to Moscow and demanded, as he did 10 years ago, to “rub out terrorists in the outhouse”.

However, a threatening movement of his pale eyebrows and lump horns on his forehead do not impress anybody anymore. It turns out that Putin is guilty in every case.

“If as a result, subsequent calls to the authorities to toughen and “tighten the screws”, to increase the funding for law enforcement agencies, are heard, there will be no shadow of a doubt that these explosions are the handwork of special services, Russian citizens say.

A society’s movement for a change of the inefficient, corrupt system of the Putin’s “vertical of power” is growing. Demands “Putin must go” sound from all the sides, from all the groups of the society, even from his closest associates. In these circumstances, the current government could be capable for every provocations and atrocities, just in order to stay in power.

No trust of many citizens is left anymore in the current government”, commentators and journalists write.

“In Putin’s Russia the bombings are the most important part of politics. Putin’s Russia started with the bombings. And after 10 years, the society has not seen any other explanation for these explosions, but as “the hand of the FSB”.

For 10 years, no one took responsibility on them and said a word, like, we blew you up to achieve that and that. The amazing feature of Putin’s Russia is: Terrorism in full anonymity.

Since then, terrorism in Putin’s Russia, for the most part, is anonymous. Trains derailed, planes fell, subway cars exploded – and no one makes any demands. Guess yourselves, they say, what we wanted to achieve. And this Hollywood thriller has been continuing for 10 years already.

Now, even more interesting, would Putin’s Russia end with the blasts, as it had begun?”- a former editor of the former Russian opposition paper Moskovsky Komsomolets Anatoly Baranov asks and concludes —

“Putin’s Russia began with the explosions in Moscow, Volgodonsk and the “FSB exercises” in Ryazan. Putin’s Russia has been bombing itself for 10 years with and without any reason.

I had mixed feelings about this, on one hand it’s an immense waste of money, yes, just think of all the schools and hospitals we could build, on the other hand it regenerates a whole swathe of an otherwise downtrodden and neglected East London.

Whatever your opinion, the scale of the construction is of a gargantuan proportion and some of the engineering is truly first class.

Let’s hope it delivers some kind of value to the tax payer, I wonder what the cost per million will be for every Gold medal we win in 2012?

While Ellman has been out holidaying in Israel, she did have time to state:

“Sean is 37 years old and takes his own decisions. He is a grown man.
It is a personal issue and doesn’t have any bearing on the upcoming election.”

Yeah right, pull the other one Louise, If you haven’t been able to teach your son any decency and that dealing in drugs is morally abhorrent, then why oh why should people even consider voting for you?

So we and the Tories could climb out of the trenches to play football with Geoff Hoon’s head. Now back to war

Well what a great week. Brilliant. The Tories have been granted a baby, and unto us was born a child of solid ****.

Obviously I know you have ambivalent feelings about those involved in the Dispatches show. And when it came out that it was Hoon, Byers and Hewitt who’d been done, it was a little like Christmas Day on the western front. Our press office and the Tories climbing out of the trenches to have a nice game of football kicking around Geoff Hoon’s head, to the supportive clatter of an old-time football rattle constructed from Byers’s dried-out nuts.

But even though the lobbying revelations have discredited internal rivals, I personally do not believe you would have been short-sighted enough about their political impact to have been found, in their wake, walking around No 10 swigging from a bottle of “Chekov” supermarket vodka, punching the air and singing, at great volume, and for no apparent reason, “Opal fruits! Made to make your mouth water!!” We probably need to get on top of that rumour.

Look. We can’t enjoy this. Whoever’s been nailed we still need to counter-attack, or it could be: at first they came for the Blairites and we did nothing, then they came for the trade unionists and we did nothing, so when finally they came for us there was no fucker left to brief against. We must remember also we haven’t seen the full interviews. After all, it’s possible the preamble to the screened segments went along the lines of: “Hello. We are prepared to pay a million pounds to charity if you could make out for 20 minutes that you are a self-aggrandising, phoney-worldy, shit-eating-grinning, bullshit job.”

Office matters: Re the office. Thank you for your intervention about the quality of my theoretical desk at Victoria. And due to your efforts I have now been provided with a fax machine. Presumably in case I need to communicate with Mr PJ Whackcock in Epsom, the sole other surviving user of the fax machine. Thanks. Sometimes Charlie Whelan comes in, and late at night when Damian McBride sits the other side, together they look like a lineup at The Hague for Bosnian war crimes.
Cameron baby: So re Sam Cam’s election bump. Think we shouldn’t kid ourselves that this is a big factor. The reality is – everyone here got a bit excited that the public had seen through Cameron. But we have to be very careful in terms of taking the parliamentary Labour party as a good barometer of what the British public think or feel about anything whatsoever. I mean, if you took a poll on the Death Star, you’d get a majority saying Skywalker failed to convince in terms of his vision of the future. What with a key part of his vision of the future being the blowing up of the Death Star. Now I’m not saying Cameron is Skywalker, or that you came across in public this week as combining a mixture of the dizzy optimism of Darth Vader and the incoherent moaning wail of a wookiee.

But what I am saying is that there’s a danger that we think it’s over with the public and the Tories when it’s not. Their poll dip looks to me like the public having a postcoital fag after their first good rogering from Cameron and feeling a bit “meh”. But soon enough they’re going to be ready for Dave the Happy Shopper-Clinton to turn off one of his beloved westerns and clamber on top of them to resume his determined, joyless huffing and a-puffing.

And finally … the budget: Since you asked, my view on the budget is: “Yeah, sure. Fine.” Seriously. Budget schmudget. A billion here, 20 billion there. Twenty pee on diesel oil, forty pence off kerosene. Paraffin’s up, cigarillos are down. Clogs are out, sandals are in. The Bronx is up, the Battery is down. Mortgage Pension Fund Rebate Tax has been halved by double to massive acclaim from a man on page 18 of the Daily Independegraph. I mean, I’m sure it’s all very important but no one really gives a shit do they?

33 O ye who believe! obey Allah and obey the Apostle and make not vain your deeds!34 Those who reject Allah and hinder (men) from the Path of Allah then die rejecting Allah, Allah will not forgive them.35 Be not weary and faint-hearted crying for peace. When ye should be Uppermost: for Allah is with you and will never put you in loss for your (good) deeds.36 The life of this world is but play and amusement: and if ye believe and guard against evil He will grant you your recompense and will not ask you (to give up) your possessions.

Interpretation:

To all those who are struggling to try to root out evil, the question is not of peace or conflict, but of whether Good or Evil is to prevail. They must remember that Good must ultimately prevail, and Allah’s help is with those who, as far as they can, are trying to further the universal plan.

Amusement and play are not bad things in themselves. As preparations for the more serious life, they have their value. But if we concentrate on them, and neglect the business of life, we cannot prosper. So we must always remember to use our life in this world as a preparation for the next life.

Complete self-sacrifice, if voluntarily offered, has a meaning: it means that the person’s devotion is exclusively and completely for the Cause. But no law or rule can demand it, and a mere offer to kill yourself has no meaning.

One must be ready to take risks to your life in fighting for the Cause, but you should aim at life, not death.

If you live, you should be ready to place your substance and your acquisitions at the disposal of the Cause. But it is not reasonable to pauperise yourself and become a hanger-on for the Cause.

Moreover, the inborn tendency to self-preservation in an average man would lead to concealment and niggardliness if all were asked for the Cause, by Law, and there would further be a feeling of bitterness and rebellion.

One has to question the “permanent state of emergency” which the government has placed us in, to introduce a number of so called counter-terrorism measures, which as far as protecting us, have eaten huge chunks of our civil liberties and freedoms.

Since September 11th 2001 the government has continuously justified many of its counter-terrorism measures on the basis that there is a public emergency threatening the life of the nation.

I have been a vociferous opponent of this government’s Preventing Violent Extremism (PVE) agenda, and this effective extension into making the community police one another is just another example of it’s lunacy.

To ask internet cafes to spy on their customers and students is another step in the direction of creating a society of total surveillance.

The dangers about this initiative is that it does not just focus on preventing access to illegal material but also material that is defined as ‘extremist’ without offering an objective definition of what that is.

It potentially criminalises people for accessing material that is legal but which expresses religious and political opinions that police officers find unacceptable.

It is likely to result in not only a general violation of privacy and freedom of expression but also discrimination against Muslims, whose use of the internet will be seen as inherently more suspicious.

The Institute of Race Relations issued a report last year (downloadable here) in which it found the government’s PVE programme created division, mistrust and alienation.

For all the talk of “Muslims” hating the “West” for its democracy and freedom, it seems our government is doing everything in its path to prove it is more potent than any terrorist threat, as it continually erodes our civil liberties, under the false flag of protecting us.

Unfortunately I now feel more scared of the government than I ever did of any terrorist threat.

Being so close to an election, politicians know full well that the Muslim vote will count, being a cynic I would say they are pandering to our demands, but isn’t that the purpose of an effective lobby?

"Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil & believes in Allah has grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold that never breaks. And Allah hears & knows all things."
(The Qur'an, Al-Baqara, 2: 256)

“Political authority & religion are kin brothers, neither would stand but by its companion; because religion is the foundation of political power & its pillar, & political power is the guardian of religion; political power is not established with a foundation & religion cannot be implemented without authority.”
- Shaykh Muhammad al-Yaqoubi

"War is not merely a political act, but also a political instrument, a continuation of political relations, a carrying out of the same by other means" - Clausewitz

"O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes that ye may know each other (not that ye may despise each other). Verily the most honoured of you in the sight of Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you. And Allah has full knowledge and is well acquainted (with all things)."
(The Qur'an, Al Hujurat, 49: 13)